Twitter's MoPub launches native mobile ads platform

MoPub, which Twitter bought for a reported $350 million in September, on Thursday announced the launch of its native mobile ads platform.

The idea, MoPub said in a blog post, is to give app developers a way to automatically place mobile ads, rather than have to build them piecemeal. The plan to launch the platform was first reported by the Financial Times in October.

MoPub's rationale for building the new platform is that many app developers want to be able to sell native ads, but that until now, there has been no "scalable and accessible" way for them to do so. "Native ads offer an opportunity to monetize your app more effectively by matching the original content's look and feel," MoPub said in its post, "maintaining the same great experience for your users."

With the native ad platform, however, app developers should be able to work directly with advertisers in order to place ads in apps that match those apps' features. MoPub already has 95 partners in its marketplace. "This single solution means you can provide a customized ad experience for your partners," MoPub wrote, "without building custom campaigns for each advertiser."

As an example, MoPub pointed to what launch partner Tango has done using its platform.

In a photo (see above), MoPub showed how Tango had been able to automatically insert ads both into a news feed and into a chat tab.

One other major benefit, MoPub said, is that developers can promote their own content. "Even if you aren't ready to introduce ads into your app," MoPub wrote, "native ads offer a great opportunity to market new features, drive installs for your other apps, or highlight other parts of your business within your app's natural flow."

The launch of the platform should drive new revenue to Twitter, which the social networking company needs in order to move towards profitability. Twitter went public last month, but while its stock price is doing well, it has yet to make a profit.